The jury in the trial of John Cordova, 42, heard more than three days of testimony last week from witnesses, police and medical professionals. Attorneys presented that evidence to help them determine if Cordova is guilty of multiple charges including attempted first-degree murder and two counts of first-degree assault with a deadly weapon.

Those hefty charges stem from the morning of Sept. 25, 2016, when police and prosecutors say Cordova stabbed Trisha Jones, 42, 23 times in her back in the bedroom of a house where they both stayed in Hudson. After that — when Jones attempted to flee outside — he grabbed a shovel and began to stab her with it in the skull and neck as she laid face down on the ground, according to the affidavit for his arrest.

"What (Cordova) tried to do was murder Trisha Jones," Ben Whitney, one of the case's prosecutors, said in his closing argument. "He tried to kill her. He almost did. (Witnesses on scene) saved her."

Whitney pointed out one of those witnesses, who called 911, described the assault to dispatchers in real-time. He played a recording of that call and pointed out the panic in her voice as she narrated the assault.

"This is as close to a play-by-play of a crime as you're going to see," Whitney said. "Even the dispatcher in that moment can tell (the caller) is under an incredible amount of stress because of what she's seen."

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But Megan O'Brien, Cordova's defense attorney, said the three witnesses who were on the scene that day colluded against Cordova and wanted to frame him for the stabbing. She said Jim Phillips, 56, who owned the house where the two were staying, actually was the person who stabbed Jones. She pointed out Philips gave everyone drugs the night before and said Phillips and the other two witnesses concocted a story to ensure Cordova would take the blame for the assault.

"The three of them are the reason you are here today," O'Brien told the jury.

Whitney also talked about Zachari Davis, another of the witnesses who police believe helped restrain Cordova. He pointed out how emotional Davis was when he testified about the assault last week.

"You saw his pace beginning to pick up as he went from sitting here and recalling something, to reliving something," Whitney said. "You all saw him flinch when he saw the shovel (in the courtroom). You saw the sight of the shovel brought him to tears."

O'Brien and Whitney also sparred over how the case's handling, both by the Weld County Sheriff's office and the Weld District Attorney's office. O'Brien pointed out the only confession Cordova ever gave was to a fellow inmate in the Weld County Jail. In exchange for passing that information along to prosecutors, she said, that inmate received two years in prison as opposed to the 12 he faced. She also accused police of having their mind made up about Cordova's guilt from the beginning of the investigation.

Whitney parried those arguments by urging the jury to focus on the evidence and the testimony they did have, rather than focusing on the case's undefined possibilities.

"A trial is not a search for doubt, it is a search for the truth," he said, moments before they left to debate the case among themselves. "The sum total of all the evidence points to only one direction. The idea that there is this conspiracy is a fiction. It is imaginary."